The US Navy says that the drone “Hellscape” is on track to be used against PLA in the Taiwan Strait.
The first iteration of drones, set to form part of America’s “unmanned hellscape” strategy to be used against China in a potential war in the Taiwan Strait, is on track to meet its August 2025 deadline, according to a US Navy official.
Speaking on Tuesday at the West 2025 conference hosted by the US Naval Institute and AFCEA, Alex Campbell, maritime portfolio director of the US military’s Defence Innovation Unit (DIU), said the Replicator initiative would meet the goal set by former deputy defence secretary Kathleen Hicks.
“It’s not another [science and technology] project. It is meant to get to production, meant to field systems, in this case, in support of [US Indo-Pacific Command],” Campbell said, according to the US Naval Institute’s news portal USNI News.
“It’s a lot of taking … a pretty wide and diverse set of systems and a wide and diverse set of software, and smashing them all together at a pace that is really more akin to commercial software tempos.”
First unveiled by Hicks in August 2023, Replicator is an initiative overseen by the DIU that focuses on fielding thousands of what the Pentagon calls “all-domain attritable autonomous” (ADA2) systems to create swarms of small, low-cost drone systems – including unmanned surface vehicles, unmanned aerial systems and counter-unmanned aerial systems.
The first part of the initiative is intended to link surface, subsurface drones and loitering munitions to create a “hellscape” aimed at preventing possible military aggression by the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) across the Taiwan Strait. The second part, announced last year, will be focused on countering hostile drones.
Hicks previously said countering China’s growing military was a key focus of the programme, adding that the US drone swarm would be “harder to plan for, harder to hit, harder to beat … with smart people, smart concepts and smart technology”. She set the goal to field such platforms as August 2025.
In August last year, the US Army set aside US$1 billion to purchase AeroVironment’s Switchblade 600 loitering munition, a tank-destroying drone known for helping Ukraine push back against the Russian invasion, under the first tranche of the Replicator initiative.
In November, the Ghost-X from Anduril Industries, and the C-100 from Performance Drone Works were also selected under the second tranche of the Replicator programme.
The initiative has been linked with the Pentagon’s “hellscape” strategy in the Taiwan Strait, which was first detailed by Admiral Samuel Paparo, commander of the US Indo-Pacific Command, in June last year.
He said the US would turn the Taiwan Strait “into an unmanned hellscape using a number of classified capabilities” by launching thousands of drones, from surface vessels and submarines to aerial drones, in response to a potential use of force by the PLA against the self-ruled island.
Beijing sees Taiwan as part of China to be reunited by force, if necessary. The United States, like most countries, does not recognise the self-governed island as an independent state but it is opposed to any attempt to take it by force and is legally bound to arm it for defence.
The confirmation of Washington’s progress in its drone swarm initiative comes amid increasing emphasis on unmanned platforms in a possible war between the US and China surrounding the Taiwan Strait.
During the Zhuhai air show in November, Chinese defence systems contractor China Electronics Technology Group Corporation showcased a drone swarm launch vehicle, which has a load capacity of 48 fixed-wing unmanned aerial vehicles.
In December, China launched the first next-generation Type 076 amphibious assault ships, which are equipped with an electromagnetic catapult. The vessels can carry various types of aircraft, including unmanned aerial vehicles, and are reportedly the world’s first “drone carriers”.
